SALT Newsletter (Oct 2017)Swansea Academy of Learning and Teaching

The SALT Newsletter is published in October, January and April and features items of interest highlighted by the SALT team and invited guests.

Welcome

Welcome to our newly refreshed SALT newsletter at the start of the new academic year. I do hope you will find it helpful, engaging and informative. We have provided some signposts to forthcoming items of interest and I would encourage you to visit the various links provided and of course contact the team if you would like any further details

You will also find a selection of highlights and images of our recent activities, including our flagship Learning and Teaching Conference 'Reaching for Teaching Excellence' which took place in July. If you weren't able to attend please do take a look at the resources available on the conference website.

Finally , I am also very pleased to announce that we have several new members of the team who have recently been appointed within the SALT Team and I know that you will be delighted to join me in welcoming them as they settle in to life at Swansea.

Professor Jane Thomas Director SALT

Whats in this Newsletter ? .

Contents

Meet the Team

SALT Conference

HEA Fellowship Update

Blended Learning Pilot

TEL Month

Seminars

Bite Size Courses

Blackboard Drop in

CPD Framework

Informal CPD

Please note alternative formats of this newsletter (PDF and Welsh) are available on the SALT Website

Team SALT

Meet the SALT Team

Over the last couple of months we have welcomed four new members of staff (Natalie, Jacqui, Darren, and Rhian) to the SALT team. A fifth member of the team (Suzie) will also join us shortly. Although the whole team will still be involved with all SALT activities, each member of staff will now be allocated towards a specific area of responsibility of either TEL, CPD, PG Cert and Recognition (HEA Fellowship).

TEL : Helen, Jacqui, Simon and Stuart

CPD : Debbie, Matthew and Rhian

PG Cert : Mandy and Suzie

Recognition (HEA Fellowship) : Darren and Louise

Management and Admin : Chris, Jane, Jenny and Natalie

You can read more about the SALT Team and who does what in our SALT Team Page available by clicking the button below.

Reaching for Teaching Excellence

Our Annual Learning and Teaching Conference ' #SUSALT17 Reaching for Teaching Excellence' took place this year on the 5th July and was our biggest yet with 232 registered attendees. We attracted strong representation from across all colleagues who came together to contribute, collaborate and share good practice across the university. Key note presentations from Jane Hart and PVC Martin Stringer proved both through provoking and inspiring and with over 50 excellent parallel sessions on offer there was a lot to choose from in this year's programme.

Keynotes from Jane Hart and Professor Martin Stringer

Reaching for Teaching Excellence

5 July 2017

"collaborating and sharing of ideas and views, always a good mix of learning opportunities"

Delegate 2017

Reaching for Teaching Excellence

I think the conference is an outstanding opportunity to hear about cutting edge thinking around HE teaching in the course of a jam-packed day...."

Delegate 2017

Reaching for Teaching Excellence

"An opportunity not to be missed......I really come to hear more about innovations and think about how I could incorporate ideas into my own teaching for the following year."

Delegate 2017

We are currently reviewing dates and venues for next year's event. Please follow the hashtag #SUSALT18 and keep an eye on the website for updates. For more details about the conference including videos of the keynotes, abstracts, posters, slides and other resources please visit our conference web page by clicking the button below.

HEA Fellowship

We’ve come a long Way…..

SALT launched its internal recognition route for HEA Fellowship in July 2015 with just over 100 staff with a category of Fellowship. Just 2 years on, the 2017 SALT conference marked the 300th staff recognition - a fantastic achievement, with appreciation to all those staff assessing and mentoring. Most recently, we have had 2 new Principal Fellows recognised. Follow the links to read more about Professor Steve Cooke, School of Management’s achievement and also Dr. Suzanne Darra from the College of Human and Health Science.

How might you gain HEA Fellowship recognition?

If you are considering seeking recognition for your teaching through an HEA Fellowship, sign up for our information sessions that are taking place in October and January. Find out more details on our website. Please also visit our the HEA News web page for all the latest developments in recognition at Swansea

Blended Learning

New Cross University Pilot

A new project is currently underway at Swansea to carry out a cross University pilot with the aim of developing a framework and institutional approach to blended learning (BL). The pilot will aim to convert up to 70 modules to a blended learning approach (approximately 5 modules per semester across each of the 7 colleges). The project is sponsored by Professor Martin Stringer Pro-Vice Chancellor and led by Dr Paul Holland Dean of Educational Technology and Rhian Kerton College of Engineering (CoE). More details about the project can be found using the following button.

TEL Month

Workshop Sessions ...

We have been running our popular TEL Month again this year throughout September and there are still a few places remaining on the last few workshops . The remaining workshops are running up until 6th October 2017 and can be booked via Eventbrite

Seminars

Characteristics of a Good Teacher

A series of SALT seminars are planned to take place during the 17/18 Academic year with themes based around investigations undertaken by SALT (read more here). The seminar themes will be based around Chickering and Gamsons "The Seven Principles For Good Practice in Undergraduate Education" and the dates for the first two seminars (to be held before the Christmas Vacation) will be circulated in to next few weeks with bookings being taken via the SALT events page.

If you would like to present at one of the seminars please take a look at the Principles and examples here and get in touch via salt@swansea.ac.uk

Bite Size CPD

Bite Size Courses

Flipping the Classroom

October 1, 2017 sees the launch of SALT’s latest CPD module, the Flipped Classroom. Based in Blackboard, this self-supported course will explain the concept of the flipped classroom approach and the pedagogy behind it. It will also showcase some of the ways in which you can ‘flip’ your classroom and allow you to try out a few of the tools available to help you do this.

Inclusivity

Our Inclusivity module is also available for study. This is Blackboard course which is designed to help all teaching and support staff to develop a more inclusive approach to their role. The course contains lots of information about your obligations in terms of the law and Swansea University’s policies regarding provision for the full range of protected characteristics.

Drop in Sessions

Blackboard

From the beginning of October the TEL (Technology Enhanced Learning) team of SALT will be running weekly drop-in sessions on both Campuses. Drop-in sessions are intended as an opportunity for short one to one meetings to fix Blackboard issues, talk about ideas, get modules added or removed, get a quick bit of help with something etc. Not really as an hour long training session … especially in the first few weeks of term … For more information please visit our Blackboard Drop In Sessions Web Page using the button below.

If you need more of a training session please contact us at blackboard@swansea.ac uk and we’ll get back to you to arrange something suitable.

Continued Professional Development

CPD Framework

The SALT CPD Framework is pedagogically driven and underpinned by evidence. It is mapped to the HEA UKPSF and will incorporate Open Digital Badges where possible. It is made up of the following elements

Informal CPD

Top Tips for Learning and Teaching

We would like to invite the community to help us build a suite of links, resources and top tips that people have found helpful for informal CPD. If you have any top tips that you would like to share so please do contribute by posting on one of the community Padlets available from the Top Tips button below. ( You don't need a Padlet account to contribute )